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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/29937003">god won't take my calls (so i'll make my own way home)</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/gay_writes_with_mac/pseuds/gay_writes_with_mac'>gay_writes_with_mac</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>and maybe i'm lonely (maybe that's all i'm qualified to be) [1]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Supernatural</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Alastair is an asshole, Bela Talbot &amp; Dean Winchester Friendship, Bela-Centric, Big Brother Dean Winchester, Cas Drags Bela Out Of Hell And It Sucks For Everyone Involved, Castiel Raise Bela From Perdition Challenge, Gen, Graphic Depictions of Hell, Little Sister Charlie Bradbury, MLM/WLW Hostility, The Bunker Gang But I Fixed It, Torture, Trials of Hell (Supernatural), mlm/wlw solidarity, my religious trauma is showcased, why did charlie go to oz wtf even was that</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>In-Progress</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2021-03-09</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-04-11</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-15 23:02:45</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Mature</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Graphic Depictions Of Violence</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>2</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>4,914</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/29937003</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/gay_writes_with_mac/pseuds/gay_writes_with_mac</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p><i> i'm mad at god <i></i></i><br/><i></i><br/>Bela knew she was going to Hell. What she didn't know was that she was coming back out. Angels are real, God is MIA, and the Winchester boys think they can lock up Hell for good.<br/>It sounds completely impossible. But hey, she's been out of the game for five years. And more importantly, if they slam the gates of Hell shut, that means no one can throw her back in.</p><p>  <i> because if he exists why do i still feel like this? <i></i></i></p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Bela Talbot &amp; Dean Winchester, Castiel &amp; Bela Talbot, Charlie Bradbury &amp; Dean Winchester</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>and maybe i'm lonely (maybe that's all i'm qualified to be) [1]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/2201649</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>7</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>11</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. Chapter 1</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Bela never thought she’d hold out.</p><p>She knew it was coming. Every day, Alastair went around and badgered at the older ones, the ones that were close to breaking, pestered and coaxed and pushed them to get down off the racks and take up the knife. She knew her turn was coming. And every day - <em> day, </em> she said, as if there was such a thing as <em> day </em>in the Pit - she told herself (I will.) The first chance she got. Before the words had left his mouth, she would climb off the rack - the hooks in her shoulders tore at the muscle and scorched her with a savage pain like gnashing teeth through her body - and torture anyone he put in front of her.</p><p>But then it happened. Alastair dropped the set of razor-blade claws he’d been raking over her stomach to slice her into ribbons and waved invitingly at the nearest rack of souls, at the tray of torture instruments, at the key to her chains. He leered at her, blood and drool dripping from his broken teeth. </p><p>And Bela shook her head. </p><p>Alastair’s head jerked back - shock, maybe, or confusion. “No more pain,” he offered, his voice as low and grating as gravel - “no more pain ever.”</p><p>But Bela knew that that was a lie, because she couldn’t remember ever a single time she wasn’t in pain, and even if Alastair never touched her again she had her memories and that would keep her in enough agony to last her the rest of her days, and even some borrowed time, too. “You can shove it,” she said, as delicately as she could with a voice raked raw from screaming, “up your arse. As far as it will go. Far enough that you’ll be tasting it.”</p><p>He ripped out her eyeballs and fed them to her for her impudence but even then she couldn’t wipe the smirk off her face.</p><p>And she said it again the next day.</p><p>And the next.</p><p>And the next.</p><p>And the next.</p><p>And the next.</p><p>And the next.</p><p>And the next.</p><p>And the next.</p><p>And the next.</p><p>And the next.</p><p>And the next.</p><p>And the next.</p><p>And the next.</p><p>And the next.</p><p>And the next.</p><p>He drew a bath of her blood and drowned her in it. He ripped out her intestines inch by inch and sliced them into strips like confetti. He broke her arms in enough places he could tie them in a knot behind her back. He plunged a spit through her and roasted her upon it. Bela lived and died hundreds upon hundreds upon thousands of tiny, pointless lives, and every time she died screaming, she drew a sudden gasp of life again a second later. Her body became a fresh, clean canvas every time, a blank slate upon which for Alastair to work.</p><p>And it was never going to stop and it was never going to stop and it was never going to stop and it was never going to stop and it was never going to stop and it was never going to stop and it was never going to stop and it was never going to stop and it was never going to stop and it was never going to stop and it was never going to stop and it was never going to stop and it was never going to stop.</p><p>Well, it would one day. When her soul could take no more and she became a demon. She wondered, briefly, vaguely, if she would feel it coming. If it would turn on slowly, like someone hitting a dimmer switch on her humanity. Or maybe it would be all at once. Just like a light switch. She’d wake up one day with pitch black eyes and then she’d be a demon.</p><p>Alastair reached in and ripped out her spinal cord through her mouth and as that familiar blackness crashed down over her eyes all Bela could think of was if she’d ever be a crossroads demon. If she’d ever make a deal with a kid. If she’d ever kill anybody’s parents. </p><p>She was tied next to Dean when he finally broke.</p><p>She tried to stop him. Harder than she should have. More energy than he was worth, even with that pretty, pretty face, all covered in blood. She goaded him, mocked him, asked him what kind of man he was, (if he couldn’t even hang on longer than some little girl? Come on, Winchester, be a <em> man </em> about it-) Then when that quit working she played the Sam card (what would your brother think? Hang on for your brother, Dean, come on, come <em> on, </em> Winchester, you brainless dolt-) And then when that failed, she begged, begged from the very bottom of what was left of her heart (don’t you <em> do this to me, </em> Dean, don’t you get off that rack, don’t you break <em> now, </em> you weakling, you absolute <em> weakling, </em> hang <em> on-) </em></p><p>But he broke. He broke and he got off the rack and she was the first soul he turned on. And if Alastair was an artist, taking his time and breaking her to pieces slow and pretty, Dean was a three-year-old elbow-deep in fingerpaint. He ran rivers of her blood and made messy masterpieces, tore out her innards without much finesse, pulled out her eyes but it never occurred to that thick skull of his to shove them down her throat. He might have had the enthusiasm, but he never did learn the technique. Bela told him as much, at least before he tore out her vocal cords, let him know that (you’re sloppy, Winchester, look at this, those razor cuts aren’t even <em> straight, </em> get it together, I’m worth <em> more than this- </em>)</p><p>(I could be better,) she thought to herself, twisted and dark. She could be. She had the eye for it. Tug out teeth one by one and embed them in your victim until you have a pretty drawing. Flay off their skin until you can drape their old tattoos over their faces and show them their lovely artwork. Rip out their hair and make a rope and suffocate them with it. Stuff hot coals down their throats until a hole burns through them from the inside. </p><p>Bela thought every second of every minute of every hour of every day about hurting people and somehow that made it a little easier not to hurt them.</p><p>She was there the day he was lifted up, too. Alastair loved to put them together - he always told her that she screamed <em> so </em> pretty, especially when she clutched at Dean’s hands and begged him to stop, pleaded with him with delicious earnesty to ( <em> stop it, </em> Dean, <em> please, </em> this isn’t you, this isn’t you, stop <em> hurting me- </em>)</p><p>He was drowning her in acid when it happened, which was why she didn’t see much. He had her on her knees and his hand fisted in what was left of her hair and she was mindlessly thrashing for freedom - she knew it wouldn’t come, and she knew the death wouldn’t stick, but her lungs had never quite adjusted and learned to stop screaming for air - and then light was everywhere and then Dean was just gone. <em> “Angels,” </em>Alastair spat, but Bela was too weak to pick her head up so she drowned in the acid and when she jolted back to life there was no trace of angels, or of Dean. They left his spot empty just above her, so she could gaze at it constantly and remember how alone she was. </p><p>(Just get off the rack just do it just do it just do it just do it just do it just do it just do it just do it just do it just do it just do it just do it just do it just do it just do it just do it just do it just do it just do it just do it just do it just do it just do it just do it just do it-)</p><p>Her mind begged her to but her body refused. For five years, Bela endured. Even when she didn’t know why, she endured. </p><p>Alastair had her stretched out on the racks and was pulling out every tendon in her body and weaving a noose with which to hang her when it happened. The cold grey sky of hell split apart like the Red Sea under the Staff of Moses and light - the first real, true light she’d seen since the hellhounds slashed her open and dragged her away. It burned her anew and soothed her wounds at once, washed over her with an agonizing healing, a kiss that scalded her skin. </p><p>Demons and souls moved back alike as it floated down. Even Alastair shied back in the face of heaven. But Bela couldn’t move. Couldn’t even twitch. She yearned to hide her bruised and ruined face, to cower away from the light in which her broken soul did not deserve to bathe. But she couldn’t turn away. </p><p>A hand closed around her arm, gripped her shoulder, burned its print forever into her flesh. Bela couldn’t even muster a scream. Her eyes suddenly threatened to close, to whisk her away into darkness, but she fought it. She gazed up and into the face of an angel.</p><p>He was a thirty-something mousy little man with a fine jawline and piercing blue eyes with claws that dug in under her flayed skin. He looked more equipped to do her taxes than to save her soul.</p><p>He chuckled, softly, as if reading her thoughts. “Sleep, Bela,” he said, and his voice was low and gravelly and weighted down with age. “By your wounds may you be healed.”</p><p>And then she could fight it no longer and at last, for the first time in the five years she had been tortured in hell, Bela slept.</p>
<hr/><p>Cas was never one to waste time knocking. </p><p>Dean and Charlie were locked in an intense game of checkers around the roaring fire they’d lit in one of the many hearths of the bunker. Sam sprawled out on one of the vintage leather couches, nose-deep in a book of ancient languages from the Men of Letters’ stash. Angel-free, demon-free, Leviathan-free...life, for once, was all right.</p><p>At least for Dean, it was, as he triumphantly triple-jumped Charlie and deftly scooped up three of her red checkers from the board. “That’s what you get for always being red,” he smirked, adding them to his handsome stack of prizes piled up at his side of the board. “Your move, shortstop.”</p><p>Charlie huffed with irritation, cast a glance towards Sam on the couch. When he made no move to come to her rescue, she rolled her eyes. Hesitantly, she picked up one of her few remaining pieces.</p><p>And then the door flew off its hinges. </p><p>Dean’s hand went straight to his gun. He reached out and shoved Charlie securely behind him before she could so much as squeak in protest. The checkers scattered across the cold concrete floor. On the couch, Sam leapt to his feet, frantically patting his pockets for a weapon.</p><p>The figure in the doorway was cloaked in shadow, but definitely humanoid. Dean cocked his gun, his finger trembling on the trigger. <em> There’s supposed to be warding, how did a demon get its ugly black-eyed ass out </em>here-</p><p>Charlie lunged forward from behind him suddenly, slapping the gun from his hand. It hit the ground with a clatter, spinning wildly on the floor.<em> “It’s Cas!” </em></p><p>The figure - she was right, it was <em> Cas, </em>and Dean exhaled harder than he meant to with the relief - strode in quickly, pushing Sam out of the way to go to the couch. “Get me blankets and fetch the first aid kit,” he commanded, kneeling in front of the couch. “She’s barely breathing.” </p><p>Sam bolted for the first aid kit. Charlie mumbled something about the blankets and staggered off, even paler than usual and so visibly shaken her feet didn’t hit the ground right. And then it was just Dean and Cas and <em> whoever it was, </em>alone in the living room with checkers spilled across the floor and a fire crackling in the hearth. </p><p>Dean’s heart was suddenly in his throat; he could feel it throbbing. His veins were freezing over. And when he spoke, his voice shook. “Dammit, Cas, who’s on the couch?”</p><p>Cas gazed at him and said nothing. After a moment - the longest moment in the entire world’s history of moments - he stepped back from the couch. The fire caught her face and cast it into the light. Dean stumbled back without meaning to; seeing her kicked the air out of his lungs like a punch to the gut, and ached just as bad.</p><p>Lying on his couch, bundled up in Castiel’s trenchcoat, beaten and bloody and bruised and barely breathing but he’d recognize her anywhere, the face that had been seared into his brain, (the first one he’d ever sunk his claws into in hell)<em> , </em> was <em> Bela. </em></p>
<hr/><p>The archangels hadn’t had much to do with Bela’s express ride to the top, not like they had when Cas had lifted Dean. No pinewood box, no miraculous healing, no rehymenation. Bela came out of Hell in the same state she’d gone in - hopelessly mauled by a hellhound.</p><p>Cas had patched up the biggest wound - a slit throat - as soon as he’d pulled her out of Hell. But he wasn’t at his strongest; he couldn’t do any more for her than that, not for some time. So they patched up Bela the human way, by hand, with a first aid kit and an IV in her arm. </p><p>Five years. Five years, she’d been in Hell. Dean bit his lip until blood flooded his mouth and wondered if she’d ever broken. If she’d ever gotten down from the racks and taken up the scythe. He hoped she hadn’t, as he held her head in his lap and traced a finger over one of the dozens of rows of neat stitches with which Sam had put her back together. </p><p>He can still hear her voice sometimes. Bloody and broken and raw, he can hear her screaming at him.</p><p>
  <em> She tried so hard to save him- </em>
</p><p>
  <em> <s>-and it was all for nothing<s>-</s></s></em>
  <s>
    
  </s>
</p><p> </p><p> </p><p>
  <em> - and he cut her to pieces for her efforts- </em>
</p><p>He can still hear her shrieks of agony on the racks, too. The way she screamed and begged for him to stop. He never stopped. Never for a second did he even let her breathe.</p><p>And he never even thought about going back for her. </p>
<hr/><p>Twenty-six hours after Cas blasted the door off the bunker, Bela woke up. </p><p>Even before she opened her eyes, she knew she wasn’t in Hell anymore. Because she couldn’t be, because she was <em> warm </em> - not burning, not freezing, <em> warm </em>- and the pain was gone, at least the worst of it. Her body ached, but there was no tearing, no ripping, no blood oozing over her naked flesh in a sticky, sickening river. </p><p>A hand smoothed over her hair. Rough, callused, but...gentle. The first gentle touch since...since she didn’t know when.</p><p>Bela let her eyes flutter open slowly, wincing against the burning lights. Exhausted, aching, scared, she gazed up and into Dean Winchester’s eyes. They were suspiciously wet, she realized, as his hand stroked over her hair again. “Hey, Bells,” he said softly, and his knees shifted under her head - he’d been holding her. “Good to see you when we’re both breathing.”</p>
<hr/><p>Bela wolfed down a disgustingly greasy hamburger - God, she would never get used to the incredibly low bar Americans settled for when it came to their food - as soon as she could sit upright and threw it up in the bathroom not even five minutes later.</p><p>The angel followed her - Castiel, he had introduced himself, but the Winchester boys called him <em> Cas </em>and she liked that better, more informal, more befitting of an angel that looked like an accountant. He somehow managed to hold her hair back without actually keeping even a single strand out of the splash zone and rested a heavy hand between her shoulder blades. An attempt at comfort, she guessed, but it was as subtle as his swan dive into Hell had been and far less reassuring. </p><p>“I’m okay,” she promised him, the words scraping up her raw and blistered throat as she wiped her mouth on the sleeve of the shirt Dean had loaned her. “Really. I’m just not used to eating again yet.”</p><p>“Are you sure?” He frowned. His hand touched her forehead, and it was a kind touch, a gentle one, but it burned - burned like it had when he touched her in Hell, and suddenly beads of sweat were forming on her forehead, he was too much for her, too much-</p><p>Her soul wasn’t clean yet. She couldn’t handle an angel’s touch.</p><p>Cas drew back suddenly, as if he’d realized the moment she did. “I can’t touch you,” he murmured, shuffling backwards. “You’re still-”</p><p>“Unclean,” Bela interrupted. She drew her knees up to her chest and leaned back against the wall and curled up like a nudged pill-bug. “I got pulled out of Hell and not everything came back. Not yet. I’m not human enough for you to touch me.”</p><p>For an angel, Cas was surprisingly socially inept. He just stood there and shuffled his feet and frowned at the ground with a puckered mouth, just enough distance between them to make it feel weird, his burning hands hanging limply at his sides.</p><p>“I’ll fix you,” he said at last. “I’ll find a way to fix you.”</p>
<hr/><p>Bela was still sitting there, hunched over in a ball and trying not to think too hard about anything, and Cas was still standing there too, as stiff as a scarecrow with as much emotion on his face, when Dean pushed the door open. He looked tired - as tired as Bela felt, identical lead weights dragging them down kicking towards the depths of sleep. </p><p>“Cas,” he said, oddly gruff even for him, “buddy, how ‘bout you give us a minute?”</p><p>And Cas closed his eyes and disappeared with the faintest sound of the rustling of wings, because of course he did, of course Dean Winchester could give commands to even angels. It was just the two of them, now, and Dean sank down next to her and drew his own knees up to his chest, leaning back against her wall, an electrified wall of shame piling itself up in the inches of space between them.</p><p>“Bela-” he started, but she stopped him.</p><p>“Don’t. You did what you had to do.”</p><p>“You didn’t.”</p><p>“I’m not you.”</p><p>“I-” his voice caught in his throat and he paused for a minute. “You never did, did you?”</p><p>Bela mutely shook her head.</p><p>“Why not?”</p><p>“I wanted to.” The words fell heavy from her mouth, stones tumbling into a lake and sinking down, down, carrying with them the taint of her sins. “I thought I would. Sometimes I even tried to. But I couldn’t do it.”</p><p>“Weird.” He tried to laugh, but it just sounded strained. “Out of the two of us-”</p><p>“It would be me.” She couldn’t blame him; she’d thought the same thing herself. Repeated it like a mantra, trying to convince herself to <em> break already and let it be over. </em>“It should have been. I would have made one hell of a demon.”</p><p>Dean paused; cleared his throat. It took longer than it should. “You really don’t know, huh?”</p><p>“I really don’t.”</p><p>“Weird,” he said again. “Just...fucking weird. You stole my car, you shot Sam for fun, you tried to kill us both...but you never broke. Hell, you tried to keep <em> me </em>from breaking...harder than you should have, harder than I deserved-” His voice caught again, harder, sharper, breaking on a jagged knife, but he wouldn't cry. Wouldn't let her see that. She’d already seen one of his worst sides, the vicious side, the cruel side, the cold side. He wouldn't let her see the broken one.</p><p>He wrapped an arm around her shoulders, and she half-expected his touch to burn, but it didn't. It was gentle and it was warm and she slowly leaned into it despite her rows of stitches, leant her head on his shoulder and let him hold her...again. “I’m so sorry, Bells,” he said finally, whispering fiercely into her hair, his breath hot against her scalp. “I’m so sorry.”</p><p><br/>
<br/>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. better to burn out</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>The adventure begins.</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <em>
    <span>The first thing Dean saw wasn’t the ghost of the drowned sailor but rather Bela’s eyes going wide, wide, wide as half-dollar coins, mascara-coated eyelashes fluttering in a panic. She spat droplets that rained down and splattered against the grass beneath their feet, slender green blades that her terrified feet trampled down into flat pads of earth. A little gush of water burst from her lips and she coughed hard, hands clutching at her throat, straining for air already. </span>
  </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>
    <span>Bela was drowning on dry land. She vomited up more water, a stream of it this time, dripping down her front and splashing against the grass. It stole another gasp of precious air from her lungs. There was fear in those big, round eyes, real fear, the kind of terror that Dean usually associated with the ever-rotating cast of pretty damsels he and Sam always found themselves sweeping out of distress. </span>
  </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>
    <span>Bela was many things, but she was no damsel. </span>
  </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>
    <span>Logically he should have wanted to watch her drown on a patch of grass. That would have been sweet, sweet poetic justice, watching her suffocate on air she’d given away right  along with the sailor’s hand. Literally trading her last breath. But his heart was suddenly thudding too fast in his chest and adrenaline coursed through his veins, making him shaky, so shaky, fingers trembling visibly as he reached out for her. </span>
  </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>
    <span>One hand found Bela’s back, the other wrapped firmly around her waist. She was shaking, her knees threatening to give out. She stumbled against him as soon as he touched her, falling back against his side for support. Dean’s hand thumped her back encouragingly and she retched up even more briny seawater, choking on it, gasping, her eyes running wildly as she struggled to breathe. </span>
  </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>
    <span>The ghost was nothing but a blip in the corner of his eye. He couldn’t even see Sam. He couldn’t tear his eyes away from Bela, from the water spouting from her lips and the panic in her eyes and the tiny half-crescent marks her nails dug into his arm as she clung to him. She was drowning. Seconds from death.</span>
  </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>
    <span>And then she wasn’t anymore. A final spurt of water fauceted from her dripping mouth and then it stopped, her chest heaving for air, ragged gasps tearing her throat. Her hand was still locked firmly in place around Dean’s arm. </span>
  </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>
    <span>She was alive. She was alive, she’d survived it - but she hadn’t, because the skin was peeling back from her face and hollowing out her cheeks and turning to the dusty old bone of skeletons - she was decaying, decomposing, </span>
  </em>
  <span>dead </span>
  <em>
    <span>- and her fingers were still locked around his arm-</span>
  </em>
</p>
<p>
  <span>And then he was awake, bolt upright in his bed in the bunker, sheets kicked down into a tangle at the foot of the bed and his chest heaving as he struggled to get his breath. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>He checked the clock. Quarter to four. That made nearly five hours of sleep before something woke him up. He’d slept in.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Someone was moving around in the main room - he could hear it through the walls. Bela. No matter what time Dean woke up, Bela was up earlier and Charlie and Sam later. And Cas never slept at all, a watchful eye that protected the bunker while the rest of them attempted to slumber at least enough to stay functional.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>In the end it had been Bela that tied Cas down to the bunker, even if Dean swore on any god or monster that his constant pleas had been softening him for months. Hell had been hard on her - it was hard on anyone, but she’d rotted down there for years before Castiel raised her. She insisted that the details were blurred, that she’d forgotten much of it as Cas had fought his way back out of Hell with her in his arms. Dean was fairly sure he knew better. She flinched a little too easily, stayed a little too quiet, clung a little too close to her savior, Cas. The first scar she’d picked up down there, a claw wound from a hellhound, had never healed all the way and there was still a lumpy line of scar tissue that started in the hollow of her right shoulder and dragged down to her third rib. Once or twice a week, Cas would sit down with her and touch her forehead, try to glue back the cracks with the divine power that coursed through his veins, but he’d privately confessed to Dean - </span>
  <em>
    <span>privately, </span>
  </em>
  <span>in a very particular sense of the word - that he was reaching the outermost bounds of his ability to heal and repair.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>If even an angel couldn’t put Humpty Dumpty back together again, Bela herself certainly couldn’t either. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Dean dragged himself out of bed. Stretched. Winced as his shoulder cracked loud enough to echo through his room like a gunshot. He hit the lightswitch and the sudden beam glanced off the photo propped up in the corner. As much as he told Sam he was going to decorate, make the place feel like home, he’d never gotten around to it. All he had besides the bed and his clothes was that picture frame - there was one in each of their bedrooms. Bela’s doing, with Charlie’s input. The fiery-haired genius had rigged up a camera to snap a photo hands-free and they’d all crowded in for a picture. Dean in the far-left corner with Bela in front of him, his arms wrapped good-naturedly around her shoulders. Charlie next to him, looking a little starstruck as her arm brushed Bela’s - she wasn’t the subtlest about that little crush of hers, and Sam by her side, a lanky arm slung around her. And then Cas in the far right corner, half his shoulder out of frame and hands in the pockets of that dirty trenchcoat. He wasn’t smiling because why would he? Charlie’d given up on getting him to smile for a camera after four or five shots. “He looks more like himself when he’s being a Sour Patch Kid instead,” she’d decided as she and Bela put the photos into frames.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>A speck of dust had settled onto it and Dean flicked it off. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Bela was where he’d guessed she’d be, in the main room, perched on the edge of the table with a book as thick as her fist open in front of her. Cas hovered behind her, reading over her shoulder. They both barely glanced up when he walked in.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“We heard from Kevin,” Bela said distractedly. She looked even worse than she had last night; her face was the shade of skim milk and her eyes were rimmed in dark purple like a raccoon. One of Sam’s oversized flannels hung over her shoulders, sagging off her thin frame. She hadn’t bothered with pants this early in the morning. “Came through about an hour ago.”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Oh, yeah?” Dean fished through a dusty cupboard; pulled out a glass from the back. Ignoring the way Cas looked at him, he poured himself a morning wake-up call from his best friend Jack, then, after a second, made one for Bela. He pushed it over to her, dragging a chair over the stone floors with a </span>
  <em>
    <span>screech </span>
  </em>
  <span>to join them at the rickety old table. “What did Special K dig up this time?”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“The first trial,” Cas said in that gravelly voice, gazing over Bela’s shoulder. Dean leaned forward to look too. It was a homemade scroll, a rolled-up bit of notebook paper Kevin had scribbled away upon. It had been sealed; he could still make out the bits of broken-up wax around the edges. Angel warding, probably. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“The first-” Dean’s head snapped back and he turned to look up at the angel. “You’re holding the first trial in your hands and you let Sam and me </span>
  <em>
    <span>keep sleeping?</span>
  </em>
  <span>”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Don’t get your panties in a twist, hotshot,” Bela said silkily, running a red-tipped finger over the edge of the paper. Even in the bunker, she somehow still found time to paint those talons of hers. “We haven’t a clue on how to even </span>
  <em>
    <span>start </span>
  </em>
  <span>the first trial. Sammy can still get his beauty sleep.”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“We’ll see about that. What is it?” Dean thrust his hand out for the scroll, but Bela held it back, gazing at him with those wide blue-grey eyes, shockingly somber as she sipped at her whiskey.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“The first trial,” she said, and her voice barely, just barely, quivered. “Is to kill a hellhound. And bathe in its blood.”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Dean sat back. Cas’s stare was unforgiving. Bela’s eyes were wide. She was afraid, more afraid than she’d been since she’d drowned on dry land in the cemetery. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Of course. It hadn’t been that long ago since Cas had busted her out of hell. She wouldn’t be skipping for joy to go after something that could drag her right back in.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Dean shoved his chair back. </span>
  <em>
    <span>“Sammy!”</span>
  </em>
</p>
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